I am looking to brew a beer and add a chipotle pepper to it. I am newer to home brewing and this will be my first time straying from a specific recipe. My system is a 5 gallon system. I do not want a strong chipotle taste, just a slight undertone of the chipotle. Thanks in advance for any assistance.
I've never used peppers, but I would add the pepper in secondary and taste periodically until it reaches the level of flavor you want. As far as the amount of peppers, I'm not sure how many you would need to add to get flavor out of them. A single pepper in a 5 gallon batch doesn't sound like enough to me.
I'd take one diced pepper and soak in ever clear (kill bugs) to make a tincture than add that whole jar to a beer. I think I'd start with one pepper since u want a pepper flavor and not pepper spray drink.
Just curious, are you looking for the smokiness of the chipotle, or the heat, or the pepper flavor or all of the above? And what's your base beer like?
Agree with @NeroFiddled we need more specifics about what you want and in what beer. An Irish Stout compared to an Imperial Stout compared to a Scottish 80- compared to an IPA, different amounts. One thing to consider is if you are wanting the flavor and smoke and fleshiness but not the heat is to use more peppers but remove the seeds and ribs from the inside of the fruit.
I've had good experience in the past with soaking dried chipotles, guajillos, and pasillas in bourbon and adding the liquid at bottling to an Imperial Porter. What is the base beer and what are you going for?
Also, I would recommend against using canned chipotles, just dried, or ripe jalapenos you smoked at home, as the paste the canned are can packaged with contains oils, garlic, tomato, and other spices that you may not want in your beer.
A little adjacent guidance. https://www.beeradvocate.com/articles/15609/chile-my-soul-homebrewing-with-peppers/
If you have no particular preference for a base style of beer to add your roasted chile(s) to, might I suggest a Porter or Stout. The roasted (and smoked) malts and chiles make a sublime combination... as one of my house beers, a Roasted Hatch Chile Porter will attest to
Thanks for all replies so far. I am aiming to do a pale ale or brown ale, adding pumpkin in the mash, and goal is to have a smokey / peppery finish when people drink it. But not overpowering smokey or peppery.
I use 1 habanyero fresh in the last 5 minutes of the boil. Then fish out the pepper and proceed as usual. I get some smoky and peppery notes, but not overkill. Have used 2 peppers in the past, but was too hot for my tastes.
If you are looking for the smokiness more than the chile heat substitute some of the chipotle for smoked paprika. I've never used it in beer but I use it often in cooking where I want people to think chipotle without burning their mouth too bad.
